Tuesday, September 05, 2006

Hooptee News

Italy's Marco Materazzi has told the real story about what was said between he and Zidane in the World cup final: "Yes, I was tugging his shirt, but when he said to me scornfully "If you want my shirt so much I'll give it to you afterwards," is that not a provocation? I answered "I would prefer your sister", it's true."
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Kansas City defender Jimmy Conrad with his latest excellent column for Soccernet: All Star Games & Broken Jaws - Liquid Diet Melancholy
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MLS Weekend scores last weekend:
Columbus 3-0 New England - Jason Garey, Eddie Gaven & Ezra Hendrickson with the 3 Columbus goals.
Dallas 1-0 Houston - Arturo Alvarez with a late winner for Dallas.
Salt Lake 0-1 Colorado - Niko Hernandez with the games only goal.
Los Angeles 2-1 Kansas City - Alan Gordon with both LA goals. Shavar Thomas scored on a headed corner kick for KC.
Chicago 2-1 New York - Chris Rolfe & Diego Gutierrez with goals for Chicago. John Wolyniec with the NY goal.
Chivas 1-2 DC - Christian Gomez with both goals for DC. Claudio Suarez scored on a PK for Chivas LA.
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Once KC loss on Saturday, DC United was guaranteed a spot in this years Eastern Conference playoffs by virute of being 20 points up with only 18 points possible left on the schedule.
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MLS Standings
East
50 DC United
35 Chicago
31 New England
30 Kansas City
29 New York
26 Columbus
West
45 Dallas
36 Houston
35 Colorado
34 Chivas
32 Los Angeles
32 Salt Lake
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After Salt Lake lost on Saturday, and also lost the Rocky Mountain Cup to Colorado, their team owner Dave Checketts had a melt down when the Colorado players dared to celebrate on the hallowed Salt Lake turf. I mean he went banana's. Verbal accosting the Colorado players on the pitch. Now he has released an idiotic statement saying how ticked off he is and how unprofessional the Colorado players are. Remember this is the same team that accused the DC coach of using racial slurs, and made a big stink out of it, only to be found totally untrue. Did Salt Lake ever make any public apologies to Nowak? Nah. Classy Checketts is a bully, a punk, and a cry baby. It's not kids league or Sunday school buddy. One obviously intelligent Salt Lake fan gets its absolutely right!
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Ives Galarcep of the North Jersey Herald agrees with me that no matter how much coaches and announcers say Amado Guevara is playing better for New York, he's really not.
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Frank Giase of the Newark Star Ledger with his weekly Red Bulls column, emphasis on new midfielder Joe Vide.
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Steven Goff of the Washington Times with a feature story on new DC United Argentine midfielder Matias Donnet.
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Andrea Canales of LA Soccer News looks at the Galaxy's secret weapon - The Defense. (Bet you didn't guess that was the answer did you.)
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Nick Green of the Daily Breeze with a look at all of the Southern California players who have gone pro recently.
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Grant Wahl looks at the impact of huge changes that happened in one day last week for Kansas City. From Sports Illustrated.
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And Greg Lalas in Sports Illustrated: Why MLS isn't as much of a slouch as you think it is
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The Houston Chronicle's Week In Review.
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The US Open Cup Semifinals are tomorrow, Sept 6:
Chicago Fire v DC United
Los Angeles Galaxy v Houston Dynamo
-Chicago will host the final if they win, but the LA-Houston winner will host if DC wins.
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USA defender Oguchi Onyewu has shaved off the corn rows, just like Ludacris.
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Dan Loney took himself to the Hall of Fame induction ceremony, then gloats about it. For American Soccer News.
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My Minnesota Thunder were eliminated from the playoff race in the USL First Division. They also run the risk of finishing last. Ugh.
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Brazil beat Argentina 3-0 on Sunday in London. It was quite the amazing display of attacking skills from both teams. If you have not seen the game yet then seek out GolTV cuz I am sure they will be running repeats all weeks long. It's worth it just to see Kaka take a corner kick clearance and race 70 yards the other direction for the final goal. Unreal!
-Rob Hughes of the International Herald Tribune reviews the match.
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Euro 2008 Qualifying on Wed Sept 6
Group A
Azerbaijan v Kazakhstan
Armenia v Belgium
Poland v Serbia
Finland v Portugal
Group B
Ukraine v Georgia
Lithuania v Scotland
France v Italy
Group C
Norway v Moldova
Bosnia-Herzegovina v Hungary
Turkey v Malta
Group D
San Marino v Germany
Slovakia v Czech Republic
Group E
Israel v Andorra
Russia v Croatia
Macedonia v England
Group F
Sweden v Liechtenstein
Iceland v Denmark
Northern Ireland v Spain
Group G
Albania v Romania
Bulgaria v Slovenia
Netherlands v Belarus
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Italy & Inter Milan legendary fullback, and current Inter President, Giacinto Facchetti dies at 64, from Reuters. He got 94 caps for Italy and was captain for 70 of those. He was also a member of the Inter squads that were said to have invented the catenaccio style.
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Simon Kuper of the Financial Times with a story on the new European rivalry growing between France & Italy: France conceives a soccer culture in spirit of revenge
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Roberto Gotta with a Serie A season preview at Soccernet. The season starts this Saturday. The big match being Fiore v Inter (the favorites).

5 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Your Thunder are safe as long as the Portland Timbers continue to implode.

5:39 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

chicago fire...6 wins and 1 draw in their last 7(including the open cup)...zach thorton getting chipped from 60 aside watch out for the men in red!!!!!!!!!!!

6:38 PM  
Blogger brucio said...

what i find almost as amazing as the chicago fire run, is the fact that tony sanneh has been a central figure in the whole thing

he was left for dead not long ago and look at him now

go tony go
go chicago go

8:37 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Why I can make that assumption: Nobody wears a wrinkled, tucked-in Adidas polo to a bar to meet people. It's about the drinks."

I've gotta get an Adidas polo shirt for the next time I go out drinking.

smatthew

12:00 PM  
Blogger Kevin-- said...

"My Minnesota Thunder were eliminated from the playoff race in the USL First Division. They also run the risk of finishing last. Ugh."

Ugh indeed. I'd try and reassure that my Timbers will save you from the cellar, but the way things have been going, they probably won't even be able to do that right...Sigh...

12:58 PM  

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